


The Crisis Convergence of Countless Captain Carrots!

by DaibhidC



Category: Captain Carrot and his Amazing Zoo Crew, DC Comics, Looney Tunes | Merrie Melodies, The Multiversity (Comics)
Genre: Gen, Multiverse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:06:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28339683
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DaibhidC/pseuds/DaibhidC
Summary: At some point between The Oz-Wonderland War and The Final Ark, Captain Carrot again finds himself transported to another world, where he meets ... Captain Carrot?
Kudos: 1





	1. Once More Down the Rabbit Hole

_The Z-Building, Los Antelopes, Califurnia, Earth-C_

In his studio in the Z-Building, Rodney Rabbit was sketching the cover to the latest issue of _Jack Curby's New Dogs_. It showed a starscape, with the outlines of a battling Barkseid and Orihound superimposed on it. It looked, if he said so himself, pretty darned cosmic.

Of course, it wasn't _Justa Lotta Animals_. But what was, these days? He had nothing against the current team (Wonder Wabbit leading it? About time!) but it wasn't the book he'd worked on. And that was fine, things move on, everything changes.

Just then, a mysterious portal opened in the corner of the studio and started to reach out to him.

"Well, not _everything_ changes," he muttered aloud. "There's still mysterious portals opening up every so often, and that's still a job for Captain Carrot!" He quickly pulled on his costume and reached for a cosmic carrot, filling the outfit up as it took effect. As the portal sucked him in, he just had time to say "I hope it's not Wonderland agaaaaa…"

_Somewhere else_

Captain Carrot looked round. He was in, well, a carrot patch. Not a very well-tended one from the look of it, possibly because it stretched off in every direction, and nobody has time for that much weeding. As he got his bearings, a figure bounded towards him, in great eighth-of-a-mile leaps not unlike his own.

Because the figure was coming from the direction the light was coming from (presumably the, or at least a, Sun, although Rodney had learned never to make assumptions when you went through a mysterious portal) it took him a while to see the newcomer clearly. When he did, he could hardly believe his eyes.

The figure was a rabbit. His fur was pure white, rather than brown and white like Rodney's, and he was wearing a familiar looking, but notably different, outfit. The yellow bodysuit appeared to be made of some kind of metal plating, with a red partial belt at the waist that was clearly purely decorative. Shiny metallic carrots fastened the red cape and gloves, and instead of a simple red C impaled by a carrot, the chest logo was on a red yoke with the carrot imposed on a more angular yellow C. But it was definitely a Captain Carrot costume.

"Now there's a blast from the past," the newcomer said. "The green trunks tell me you're from the old Earth-C, right? Is this before or after the Convergence?"

"…Convergence?" Rodney repeated blankly.

"Before, right. Which means before the Final Crisis as well."

"…Final Crisis?" Rodney didn't want his entire contribution to this conversation to be repeating things blankly, but until the newcomer said something that made the slightest bit of sense, he wasn't sure what choice he had. The other rabbit seemed to recognise this and sighed.

"This would be _so_ much easier to explain if you'd been through the Convergence. The short version is, in your time there's an infinite number of alternate universes, right? Most of them with the hairless apes running everything?"

"Sure, yeah," Rodney agreed, "Sometimes it seems like Earth-C, Earth-C Minus and Earth-C Plus are the only normal worlds out there. Is that what this is? You're an alternate me?"

"In a way. In my time there are just fifty-two worlds in the multiverse…"

"Fifty-two?" frowned Rodney, "That seems kind of arbitrary."

The other Captain Carrot rolled his eyes. (At least, Rodney thought he did. Since he had those weird Batmouse-style mirror-lenses it was hard to tell.) "You have no idea. Anyway, during the … transition period, I guess … timelines got rewritten, worlds were remade. A speedster was involved because aren't they always? And Earth-C became Earth 26. _My_ Earth."

"So, you're not just an alternate me? You _are_ me?" Something struck Rodney, "But wait, if your timeline was rewritten by all this, how do you _know_ about it? Shouldn't you just remember the new version as how things have always been?"

"Oh, I do. But I'm also a member of a group with a … privileged viewpoint. We're called Justice Incarnate (yeah, kind of braggy, President Supermac picked it, not me), and we defend the multiverse from external threats."

Rodney was just about to ask how the multiverse could even _have_ external threats, when a new voice cut in. "What the frag? Howzabout you fraggers tell me where the frag I am and what happened to my fraggin' ship?"

They turned. Another rabbit was standing there. This one had solid brown fur. He appeared to be worse for wear, both in the sense that he seemed to be somewhat inebriated, and that one eye was blind and he had a robotic leg. He was wearing a red leather jacket over a yellow jumpsuit, crisscrossed with gunbelts. There were no carrot insignias anywhere, but the colour scheme was unmistakable.

Even so, Rodney found it hard to keep the incredulity out of his voice when he asked "Are you … Captain Carrot?"

"It's pronounced K'Rot, and who wants to know?" the newcomer snarled. The other Captains exchanged glances.

"I'd guess Eighties Dark Age Captain Carrot," said Rodney, "except _I'm_ from the eighties."

The Captain of Earth 26 sighed. "Nope, this one's from Earth-Prime. Or Universe-Prime, rather, since he's not exactly from Earth. He's a genetically modified version of one of their non-sentient rabbits, created by aliens for reasons unknown, and turned into a disreputable mercenary in the Tenebrian Dominion who _just happens_ to reflect us. In a rather warped way."

Rodney shook his head, "Isn't that a bit contrived?"

"It gets worse. He's got a co-pilot who's kind of Pig Iron. And the pair of them _also_ exist on Earth-8, where K'Rot is a member of a group called the Crusaders of the Cosmos led by Adam Blake, the Legendary Comet King."

"Am I supposed to be keeping all this straight?"

"Probably not. None of it applies in your multiverse, after all."

"Are either of you fraggers going to tell me…" the newcomer began, before he was interrupted by a shadow blotting out the light.

They all turned to behold an immense figure striding towards them. As it got closer, Rodney began to make out details. It looked something like one of those humans, only with green skin and without even the sparse fur most of them had on the top of their heads, instead having some kind of glowing diodes. It was also proportioned more like a normal person (what he'd heard Supermax call a "funny animal", which he wasn't sure wasn't offensive) with big round eyes in a big round head. But more importantly, it was holding what looked a lot like some kind of futuristic rifle.

"Hewwo, wabbits," the figure said as it reached them. "Wewcome to the Cawwot Patch. You can caw me Bwainelmer."

The other reason the being looked familiar suddenly clicked into place in Rodney's head. It kind of looked like a human version of Super-Squirrel's enemy Brainy-Yak. Sadly, he was unable to consider what this might mean because K'Rot started ranting again.

"You! Are you the fragger who fraggin'…" K'Rot broke off as the weapon swung towards him.

"I suggest you be vewy vewy quiet … _wabbit_ ," Brainelmer said in a tone of low menace, and somehow managing to make "wabbit" sound like the direst curse he could think of.


	2. Secwet Owigin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Brainelmer explains his background. In his own voice. Sorry.

"So you're the expert on this stuff," Rodney hissed to the Justice Incarnate Captain Carrot, "Do you know who this guy is?"

"Sorry, no. I'm pretty sure he's from beyond the Orrery of Worlds, but he's definitely not one of the Gentry. Which is a relief, I don't mind telling you. He _might_ be from the Dark Multiverse, this sort of bizarre mashup is kind of their aesthetic…"

"You want to know whewe I come fwom?" Brainelmer interrupted, "Let me expwain."

"Here we go," the other Carrot murmured to Rodney, "Wherever they're from, villains can never resist a feedline for an origin flashback."

"You awe cowwect that I come fwom the Dawk Multivewse. My wowld was known as Eawth Negative-L. And yes, I know 'Negative-L' is a meaningwess designation, but that's the Dawk Multivewse for you.

"On that wowld, animals knew their pwace. Yes, they'd talk to you if you wet them, but beyond that wabbits wivved in holes, ducks wivved in ponds, none of them wore cwothes and any of them could be dinner."

The Captains shared a concerned look at that last bit. Brainelmer didn't seem to notice.

"Mostwy, that is. Occasionawwy an animal would get some cwothing fwom somewhewe and twy to act wike people. And they wewe allowed to do so! Nobody wecognised the dangew in this! Ducks cwaiming to be pwivate detectives because they had hats! Pigs in bow ties wivving in houses!

"Somebody had to stop this. And the final stwaw was the Super Wabbit.

"Scientists had cweated a super cawwot by exposing it to unknown wadiation. They theowised that this cawwot would imbue the consumer with super powers. And they fed it to a _wabbit_!"

Brainelmer practically spat out the last word, glaring at the three bunnies in front of him.

"I'd encountewed this wabbit befowe. He'd confused and confounded me, but at weast he acted wike a wabbit. Now he was weawing a costume! He was being hailed as the wowld's gweatest hewo! The thweat to humanity that these animals wepwesented had weached its highest fowm, and humanity was wewcoming it!

"At this point in my wife I was a miwwionaiwe. I owned a mansion and a yacht. And I sowd them both and put aww my money into aquiwing alien technowogy. I downwoaded my mind into this wobotic shell, based on a design cweated by the Computer Tywants of the pwanet Cowu. With my wobot bwain I was able to cawcuwate exactwy when the cawwot's powews would stawt to fade. With my enhanced wefwexes and tawgetting computers I was able to send a buwwet towawd the wabbit befowe he knew what was happening. I swayed the Super Wabbit fow the good of humanity.

"I didn't expect humanity to undewstand. They put me on twial. I pointed out I hadn't muwdewed anyone. Super Wabbit wasn't a pewson, so how could kiwwing him be a cwime? And do you know what they said?"

Following his outburst at the first mention of Super Rabbit, Brainelmer's voice had been getting steadily quieter and calmer and he described how he prepared to kill his foe and the aftermath of the act. Now it suddenly shot up again as he shrieked:

" _THEY TOWD ME IT WAS **DUCK SEASON**!!"_

He took a breath to calm himself, and continued.

"But they didn't weawise I had a tewepowter buiwt into my new body. As soon as they passed sentence I set it to take me as faw away as possible. And I ended up here, in the Cawwot Patch, one of the wowlds between the wowlds.

"I weawised that the fact this was a cawwot patch couldn't be a coincidence. Anawysis of the cawwots showed that they aww bowe the same wadiation as the super cawwot cweated by my wowld's scientists. These cawwots have it natuwally, and it gets passed on to other wowlds with a connection to this one. I discovewed your wowld was one of these, and that the wadiation was absowbed by a meteor. I think you can guess what happened to the meteor."

"It's the one that split into shards in my team's origin story, right?" said Rodney, "One of which landed in my window box, creating my cosmic carrots."

"Pwecicewy."

"Okay, so why are we here?"

Brainelmer glared at them. "You consumed cawwots affected by the wadiation and became a superhewo, just as the Super Wabbit did. That can't be a coincidence either.

"I theowised that Super Wabbit was an archetype, echoes of him exist thwoughout the omnivewse, and they must aww be destwoyed. You two awe the closest to him, so I took you fiwst. That one," he nodded dismissively at K'Rot, "is an outwier, whose onwy significance is that Univewse Pwime is the wewwspwing of the multivewse."

"Yeah, well frag you too," muttered K'Rot.

Brainelmer ignored him, "But soon I will call aww the echoes of Super Wabbit hewe to be kiwwed. Ones powewed by wadiation and by sowcewy. Atomic Wabbit, Hoppy the Mawvel Bunny, Happy the Magic Bunny, Comwade Cawwot, Power Jack…"

"Okay, I've met Hoppy," whispered Rodney, "The rest of them mean anything to you?"

The other Captain Carrot shook his head. "Not a clue. I think he's making them up."

Brainelmer glared at him. "Weawwy? Then wet me pwove it!"

He pressed a gadget on his wrist, and a portal appeared, and disgorged another rabbit.


	3. Red Bun

The newcomer looked almost identical to Rodney, certainly far more than the other two did. The main differences were that his costume was a darker shade of yellow, and the C had been replaced by a sickle, with the carrot impaling it having a hammer head. Also, he did not look happy.

"You are Americans, yes?" he snapped, "Are you the ones who kidnapped me from the Ze Building?"

"The Zeh Building?" Rodney repeated blankly.

"You know, the building in Lemmingrad shaped like a capital Ze," the newcomer explained, tracing a "3" in the air, "The home of myself, Major Morkov, known to you capitalists as Comrade Carrot, and the rest of the Zverinets Gruppa, or what you would call the Menagerie Group."

Rodney smiled, "I think we'd probably call it the Zoo Crew," he said, "But we're not the ones who brought you here."

"Whatever you call them, they will not be far behind me. Koshkaldunya is probably casting the location spells even now!"

"Kosh-what?" asked Rodney. Comrade Carrot rolled his eyes.

"In English it is…" he hesitated, "It is a play on words which is difficult to translate. Some combination of 'cat' and 'sorceress' would be the closest."

Rodney nodded, "Gotcha. But as I understand it, we're basically outside the multiverse here. I don't think _my_ team's magic user would be able to find us, and I, ah, suspect that yours is probably at about the same power level."

"Then who is responsible?" Comrade Carrot demanded. Rodney simply gestured towards the figure of Brainelmer.

Comrade Carrot stared. "He is what they call a _cheklovek_ , yes? A … human, in your language. I have seen such before, in my encounter with Supermarx when I gained my powers, and my meeting with Ellie Smith in the Magic Land, but it has been a long time."

"Enough of this fraggin' nonsense," snarled K'Rot, "Guess it's time to try out my new catchphrase." In a swift movement, he pulled out one of his guns and fired it at Brainelmer, while saying "Boom! You've been unlawfully killed!"

Rodney stared. "What the heck kind of catchphrase is _that_?"

"An innaccuwate one," Brainelmer replied, as he quickly raised a forcefield. However, while it stopped the missile from hitting him, a piece of shrapnel made it through and hit his wrist gadget.

Immediately, more portals began opening up, and more costumed lapines began emerging from them.

"No!" exclaimed Brainelmer, "It's too soon!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I _think_ "Koshkaldunya" works, but if it doesn't I apologise to any Russian speakers.


	4. Rabbit, Rabbit, Rabbit, Rabbit

The rabbits … and Rodney hated himself for even thinking it … were multiplying. He was pretty sure there were now at least three Marvel Bunnies in the crowd; he could see the white furred Marvel he'd worked with during the Oz-Wonderland War, but also a brown-and-white version he didn't recognise, and one with bright pink fur that sparked a vague memory of Golden Age reprints from before the BC Comics vs Pawcett lawsuit.

Besides Comrade Carrot and Cap-26, he also spotted several versions of himself. One wore a red waistcoat over a yellow shirt with a C embroidered on it, and had his ears sticking out of a cowboy hat. He wore a gunbelt with carrots in the holsters. Another wore armour, with a yellow surcoat on which a Gothic C was emblazoned, and brandished a sword with a carrot-shaped hilt. And a third wore a close version of his own costume, the main differences being that it had a green cape, and no C-and-carrot insignia at all.

There was also a black and fawn rabbit in a similar cape to the Marvels with "A.R." emblazoned on his chest, another pink rabbit in a blue outfit with no cape, a _third_ pink bunny whose costume had the full words "Super Rabbit" as a chest insignia, and a white bunny in a red t-shirt with a white triangle insignia and goggles, notable only because the peculiar root vegetable he was munching on was definitely not a carrot. Amongst many others.

"What happened to 'only 52 Earths, and most of 'em are human'?" he asked Earth-26 Captain Carrot.

"I don't think those rules apply here," his counterpart replied, "I mean, _you_ come from the previous iteration of the multiverse. I think most of these are the same. Some of them might be from different multiverses entirely."

All of them were attacking Brainelmer, but to no avail; his forcefield was too powerful. Then suddenly it stuttered, as though something was breaking his concentration. " _You_!" he hissed.

Ambling through the crowd in a relaxed fashion was a gangly grey rabbit in a blue costume with red cape and S-insignia, similar to that of Super-Squirrel or Supermike. As he approached, he casually pulled up one of the cosmic carrots, and began crunching on it.

" _There_ ya are, doc," he said to Brainelmer between mouthfuls, "I've been lookin' all over for ya!"

"No," gasped Brainelmer, "It can't be! I kiwwed you! _I kiwwed you!_ "

"Well, ya had a good try at it, doc, but ya didn't realise I've got contractual immortality." He pulled a sheet of paper with a WB letterhead out of his cape and waved it at Brainelmer. "So I _had_ ta come back. They wanted a four-picture deal, but I sez ta them 'Not if there's another basketball one', I sez. So _then_ what happened was…"

"ENOUGH OF THIS!" Brainelmer screamed, "Why won't you stay dead? Why can't I be wid of you? Why won't you _just. Stop. **Talking??**_ **"** His force field collapsed completely and he fell to the ground, seeming near tears.

Super Rabbit looked concerned. "Gee, mac, you don't look so good. Lemme take ya home and you can forget all about it." He hesitated, and turned to the other rabbits "Say, does anyone know _how_ we can get home?"

Rodney looked at Cap-26. "Well? You're the expert, right?"

The other Captain Carrot looked grave. "Yeah, and my expertise says we're stuffed. It looks like Brainelmer's teleporter is fried. If I'd come here in Ultima Thule, I'd be able to take us all back the same way. If I'd at least been _expecting_ to come here, I'd have a communicator to get in touch with the House of Heroes. As it is, we just have to hope for a _deus ex machina_. And as a comics creator, I _hate_ relying on _deus ex machina._ "

"Oh, they're fine as long as they make sense in context," said a voice from somewhere past Brainelmer. As everyone turned to look, it continued, "For instance, if the event was significant enough that a future hero with sufficient cosmic power to return everyone to their respective universes was prepared to travel back in time and do so. Assuming a setting where both time travel and future heroes can be assumed, such as this one."

The newcomer was a rabbit in a seamless golden suit, less metallic and yet more shiny than that of the Earth 26 Captain. A red cowl completely covered his face, even rising smoothly over his ears, before dropping down into a cape. At the front, the red formed a yoke like some of the other Captains, but fading to orange as it tapered to a sharper point. A red ellipse traced an orbit around it, in what was the most stylised version of the carrot-and-C logo yet.

"I'm Commander Carotene of the year One Zillion AD," he said, "Hero of Earth and leader of the Z Community."

Rodney blinked. None of the other rabbits looked any wiser about this than he was, even Cap-26. "The what now?" he said blankly.

"Z Community. It's basically the future version of the Zoo Crew. Anyway, multiversal travel's a lot simpler in my time, and this event is recorded in the history books, so I thought I'd come and give you a hand." He pulled a red box with a crossbones logo out of his cape. "So, one zap of the Debbil Dawg Dimensioniser, and the whole thing will be sorted out." He activated the box, and all the rabbits disappeared.

Almost all. Rodney was still there, as was Super Rabbit. "Hey, doc, it looks like we missed the bus!" Super-Rabbit complained.

"I wanted to have a last word with you both before you left. Firstly, Super Rabbit, Brainelmer's going with you, of course, so when you return to your own universe be ready in case he tries something."

"No problem, doc, ol' Elmer looks all tuckered out," Super-Rabbit said confidently.

"And the other thing?" Rodney asked.

"Just to thank you both. In my universe, Captain Carrot began the heroic legacy I uphold, but Super Rabbit is the multiversal archetype. I wouldn't exist without both of you, so thanks."

"Well, I guess you're welcome, mac," replied Super-Rabbit. "Multiversal archetype, huh? I bet that looks pretty good on the ol' resume."

"Uh, yeah," agreed Rodney, "It's good to know what I'm doing gets remembered. Well, sort of. I guess it's what Earth-26 me does that _really_ gets remembered…"

"He's you and you're him, and everything you did still happened," Commander Carotene insisted. "I don't want to start going on about Hypertime when things are already confusing enough, but that's the best way to look at it. Anyway, it's time to send you back. 'Till we meet again, Rodney."

There was a flash of light from the box just as Rodney was about to ask if Carotene _knew_ they would meet again. He vaguely heard Super Rabbit saying something like "I hope we don't make a wrong turn at Albuquerque", and then everything went black.


	5. Epilogues

Rodney found himself back in his studio. Everything was just as he left it. Wait … except a note stuck on his drawing board. He read it.

_Rodney dahling,_

_I'm not your messaging service, but your editor called and wanted you to know that "New Dogs" has been cancelled. You're now on the new Marvel Bunny series "Pow-Hare of SHAZAM!". They'll fax the script to you tomorrow._

_Ciao,_

_Rova_

"Like I was saying," mused Rodney, "Everything changes…"

_Centre of the Multiverse_

With the situation resolved, the New 52 Captain Carrot had returned to the studio he'd set up in the House of Heroes and reverted to plain old Rodney Rabbit. He'd got a few publicity pics to finish off, and then he had to polish his metal suit, which was a pain.

He looked at what he'd been working on before. An image of a pair of red trunks with a bushy tail emerging from them and the legend "Super Squirrel: The trunks are back!" He glanced over at the metal suit, and thought about his meeting with his past self.

"Everything changes," he thought, "But there's nothing wrong with going retro, either."


End file.
